NFL gets in toon with Nickelodeon

The NFL and Nickelodeon are teaming
to co-produce a football-themed cartoon show scheduled to debut in September,
linking the two powerful entertainment brands in what is believed to be a first
endeavor of its kind in sports.

The show, titled “Rush Zone:
Guardians of the Core,” will have a plotline featuring the typical superhero,
good-versus-evil themes, with the lead character, named Ishmael, visiting each
of the league’s 32 stadiums as part of a quest to save the world. New York
Giants quarterback Eli Manning and New Orleans Saints coach Sean Peyton have
already done voice-overs for appearances on the show.

While the NFL has reached out to the
girls’ and women’s markets in recent years, this effort returns the league to
one of its bases, with the press release due out today touting “Rush Zone” on
the “boy-targeted” Nicktoons, the Nickelodeon channel on which the series will
air.

“This is new
territory for us and new territory for Nick in the sports world,” said Peter
O’Reilly, the NFL’s vice president of fan strategy and marketing. “They see
this as a priority for them heading into the fall to drive new and more-engaged
viewers.”

The show builds off of NFL Rush Zone,
a role-playing game on kid-focused NFLRush.com that was launched in December
2007 and has more than 2 million registered users.

The TV show will start as two- to
five-minute episodes and conclude with a one-hour movie the day before the
Super Bowl.

The show’s hero, Ish, is an ordinary
10-year-old boy until he learns that all 32 NFL stadiums serve as secret
strongholds of an otherworldly life force that he must guard. An evil villain,
named Sudden Death, is determined to find the life forces and end humanity.

Ish is given the physical abilities
of an NFL player along with what the show’s developers describe as “a few
additional super powers.” He must work with the Rusherz, the NFL superheroes
representing all 32 teams, to stop the Blitz Botz, Sudden Death’s robots.

Ish is taught by a mentor named O.T.
and guided by NFL players and coaches in his journey.

“We thought it was important to
leverage what we bring to the table — we are storytellers and create narrative
— [working] with the NFL in terms of its brand,” said Keith Dawkins, Nicktoons
general manager and senior vice president of Nickelodeon Programming
Partnerships.

Nicktoons is available in 57 million
homes.

The show’s production partner is
Curious Pictures in New York City.

Currently, there are no efforts to
sell ads or sponsorships around the series, and details of any licensing plans
were not immediately available. The idea, Dawkins said, was to create the
content and build a following and then monetize the show.

Nick is planning significant
promotional efforts on and off channel, though the details are not set.

The lead character’s name, Ishmael,
does not draw from football — as do most of the other characters’ names — but
rather is the name of the young nephew of a writer on the show who died
tragically.

No other sports league is believed to
have similar show or partnership. The New York Jets several years ago did
produce an animated show called “Generation Jets” that aired locally, in the
New York market.